


The Plans We Made For Two

by cafephan



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Fluff, Pining, Reality
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-12
Updated: 2019-05-12
Packaged: 2020-03-01 12:46:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,448
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18800638
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cafephan/pseuds/cafephan
Summary: Phil is in Florida, Dan is not.





	The Plans We Made For Two

It doesn’t feel right, he doubts it ever will. Dramatic as it sounds, it’s hard to care.

Couples are never joined at the hip, it’s unhealthy, but it became his norm and stayed that way for years. Never more than a day, overnight at most. Not for a week.

And he’s constantly looking out for him, which is arguably worse. He _knows_ Phil’s on the damn plane right now, the last text he sent from the airport gate confirms as much, but he can’t help craning his neck to look over the back of his train seat with every soft _whoosh_ of the door, but of course it’s never him. It’s potentially the longest train ride he’s had in ten years.

It was supposed to be the perfect opportunity to catch up on the new albums he hadn’t listened to yet, but he finds himself making a playlist of all the random songs Phil’s been banging on about for the past couple of weeks, and having that on repeat. He doesn’t even really realise until the train pulls up to his stop.

“We hope you enjoy your stay, Mr Howell!” The receptionist hands him his keycard, and smiles widely. “You have full use of all our amenities and if you require anything at all, just call down from your room!”

He smiles and turns towards the lifts, just wanting to get to his room, freshen up and tackle the rest of the day. He’s used to turning away from a front desk and having Phil laugh at his ‘adult voice’ that he reckons Dan uses in those situations. But this time there’s nothing, just the quiet lobby stereo carrying an obscure piece of classical music Dan doesn’t recognise around the room. There’s a slight breeze coming through the open windows, he can’t really complain about anything.

It’s not quite a hotel, not quite a bed and breakfast, slightly too big to be a normal house and too small to be a villa, balancing somewhere in the middle. Phil would know the term, being filled with pointless trivia.

The room is gorgeous, there’s no denying that, complete with a little balcony overlooking the lush garden. There are ping pong tables and swingball sets dotted around the lawn, he has no doubt they’ll be some form of team building exercises at some point. He does smile when he spots the trademark red plastic cups leaning against one of the tables, ready for the innocent game to take on the form of beer pong come nightfall.

Unpacking takes no time at all, considering he’s the one of the two of them that can actually pack right in the first place, and he spares a sympathetic thought to whichever Lester is given the unfortunate task of helping Phil unpack his no doubt already creased outfits. It’ll more than likely be Kath, who always comes in to check on everyone after she’s finished unpacking herself, she’s aware of Phil’s atrocious attempts. She refuses to let him ball up his shirts in a drawer and throw his shorts and jeans haphazardly into the bottom of a wardrobe.

Dan takes a picture of his own clean unpacked clothes, and makes a mental note to send it to Phil later.

Usually when they arrive somewhere new, they take a little walk around the grounds to explore, but he has no desire to do that right now. He’s starfishing across the bed, staring up at the ceiling, tracing the pattern with his finger, something Phil does when he’s waiting for Dan to wake up in the mornings.

It comes to his attention he’s been cooped up in the room for far too long when he can walk into the bathroom and back again and still point out exactly which swirl in the ceiling hosts the swatch of mismatched paint, a murky off-white compared to the otherwise pristine pearly white.

It’s lucky that’s the moment that he receives a text from Hazel asking if he’s arrived yet, and when he says he has, she asks why the fuck he hasn’t come down to the lounge to meet everyone else. It’s a valid point. He runs his hands through his curls a few times in front of the mirror, brushes his teeth, and heads down.

Everyone is lovely, and he tries his best not to go into immediate full introvert mode, usually after a quick greeting he can retreat to the corner of the room in his introvert bubble with Phil. But he simply grabs a drink and stays beside Hazel, who is holding easy conversation with practically everyone. He laughs when everyone else laughs, chimes in when other people do, it’s a start he’s proud to have made, all things considered.

The whole retreat officially starts tomorrow, and everyone seems excited. Some talk of how they went out and bought prompt books, others bought fresh notebooks and pens, others have gone out and bought laptops and tablets just for the occasion. Dan’s excited too, but his trusty laptop will do just fine, especially when he’s doubly sure he definitely changed the wallpaper before travelling. Speculation is fine, but the less flames to fuel the fire the better. When he said this to Phil, he rolled his eyes playfully, and purposefully changed his phone wallpaper to the original picture and flipped the brunet off when he scoffed. Phil insisted “it’s cute, it needs to live on somewhere”, and though his words fought it, it was true. His screensaver was safe, too, as was his phone lock screen. Phil was purposefully the opposite.

Nobody really knows what to expect, the description was – at least Dan thinks – intentionally vague, and he’s among the majority that are slightly nervous for the unknown. Hazel is bubbly as ever, excitedly predicting what some of the workshops might be, and she keeps Dan involved in the conversation, which he is thankful for.

It comes to him as quite a surprise that nobody asks after Phil, since they’ve been almost a package deal for years, but his tweets and Instagram stories about his upcoming Florida trip probably explain themselves. Nobody asks why he’s not there, either, which comes as less of a surprise but he thought at least Hazel would mention it in private. It’s quite nice, really. An independent venture which people are respecting.

After a couple more hours of introductions and socialising in the lounge, they all get sent up to their rooms to get ready for dinner that evening. He knows it’s when everyone will be posting the pictures and videos from that afternoon.

As soon as the pictures and Instagram stories start going up and people spot him in the background, their fanbase blows up, the tweets start flowing and the theories start coming. _Have they broke up? Have they moved out? Have they fallen out?_

Usually he and Phil spend a good hour or so scrolling through them and laughing, but this time he does it for the both of them, and he’s sure Phil will do the same when he sees them. He screenshots some of his favourite jokey ones and again makes a mental note to send them to Phil later. He finds some cute dog memes mixed in which also get screenshotted and added to the list.

He’s ready for dinner in record time, not having someone to ask for their fashion advice really speeds things up. Though he made Phil sit and look at all the outfits he was taking as he modelled them before he left (and he approved of them all), it would still be nice if he had Phil there to tell him he didn’t look like a kid in his dad’s mismatched clothes. He was (finally) confident in his fashion sense, but the doubting voice in the back of his head is always louder when Phil isn’t around.

After quickly checking Phil’s flight and seeing it’s still not due to land for another hour or so, he replies to Hazel’s text about meeting for pre-drinks, locks his phone, and heads out of his room.

\--

By the time dinner is over, he feels far more comfortable. A tiny bit buzzed, of course, like everyone else, he knows full well that venues on these kind of trips offer more alcohol on the first night than any other, so people can drink and get to know each other with less awkwardness. It’s a relief that he gets on with everyone well enough, can now hold conversations with everyone without needing Hazel there as his safety net, and he’s actually kind of excited to get started in the morning.

He is one of the first to leave, though, most people head for the garden for beer pong and a small bonfire, a few linger in the dining room to finish up their conversations, and a few, like Dan, retire to their rooms. He hugs Hazel goodbye and waves to some of the others he had just finished conversing with, and tries not to break into a sprint up the stairs.

Phil’s text came through between the second and third courses, and Dan reasoned with himself that Phil still needed time to travel to the villa and unpack, so tried his hardest not to look at his phone again until he left. But he couldn’t quite make it all the way up the stairs without checking.

 

_Phil: landed!_

_Phil: and now unpacked! mum says you can’t not come anymore because my attempts at packing disgusts her_

He breaks into a grin and can barely make it into his room before tapping the facetime icon and settling down on the bed.

Whilst the dial tone rings out waiting for Phil to pick up, Dan takes another look around the room, at the modern wooden furniture, that stupid fucking mismatched swatch on the ceiling, the slight chip in the door-

“There’s the bestselling author!” Phil is grinning, and Dan can’t help but copy it.

“We’re already bestselling authors, twat,” Dan replies with a laugh, and Phil purses his lips for a moment.

“Shit, yeah. Can I redo that greeting?”

“You cannot,” Dan says, and Phil narrows his eyes in a playful manner. “So how’s Florida?”

“Nice,” Phil shrugs, “Room seems really big this time around, though.”

At this, Dan smiles sadly. “So does mine.”

“Weird,” Phil says. “It’s also really warm already, you’d love it.”

“I can see, you’ve already got the shoulders out,” Dan teases, and Phil tilts his phone down to get a clearer view of his shoulders, and does his best to roll them. “For the love of god, stop that.”

“Getting turned on by bare shoulders through facetime? That’s a new low, surely?” Phil smirks as he tilts the phone back up.

“More like getting blinded, but whatever helps you sleep at night, friend.”

“I’ll try to remedy that whilst I’m sunning it up, just for you.”

Dan smiles and fidgets on the bed, getting more comfortable. “I’ll write you something pretty for when you get back.”

Phil places a hand over his heart and sticks out his bottom lip. He stays like that for a second before picking up the phone and bringing it up close to his face. “Can I request it involves a Corgi named Bruce?”

At this, Dan bursts into laughter and quickly clamps his hand over his mouth remembering the people in the room beside his might be trying to sleep, but Phil is grinning again.

“I’m not letting you call any dog Bruce, whether imaginary or real.”

Phil playfully pouts again. “Bit rude to all the Bruces out there. I think it has a certain appeal.”

“So does the end call button.”

“Touché.” Phil places the phone back where it was originally. “There’s a chance our taxi driver from the airport was called Bruce.”

“Oh _really?_ Never would’ve guessed. Your creativity knows no bounds, Phil.”

“I suddenly see what you mean about the end call button having appeal.”

“You would never,” Dan says.

Phil shrugs again. “True, but doesn’t mean a man can’t dream.” He sighs wistfully.

“Enjoy the time away from me because the second you’re back I’m punching you in the face for that.”

“My soon to be beautiful sunkissed face? Good luck with that, I’ll be bringing Bruce back with me for protection.”

This is the kind of stupid shit they always get to talking about, and Dan absolutely fucking loves it.

“That’s alright, I’ll be sat with Bruce the Corgi to keep me company.”

Phil gasps. “Okay fuck Bruce the taxi driver I want the Corgi.”

“We’re a package deal. You want him you get me.”

Phil sighs and taps his chin a couple of times, as if contemplating. “I guess I can live with that.”

Though he tries to prevent it, Dan yawns.

“Am I that boring?” Phil teases, and Dan flips him off whilst covering his mouth and finishing a second yawn. “I guess you do need your beauty sleep, you didn’t get all that much last night after all.” There’s that damn smirk that Dan hates to love.

He flips Phil off again.

“I’m going to hang up because as fun as it is teasing you whilst all you do is yawn, I do want you to get enough sleep to be able to write me something pretty tomorrow, okay?”

Dan falls onto his side and holds his phone in front of him. “Okay.”

“I forgot of my crippling fear of ending facetimes, I can never do it. Can you?” Phil asks, eyes bright in the American sunlight.

Dan simply nods and waves before clicking the end call button and letting the phone fall onto the bedspread. He quickly gets changed and ready for bed, and by the time he slips under the covers, Phil has sent a video. A smile spreads across his lips as the video shows Phil tracing the pattern of his room’s ceiling, just like Dan did in his own a few hours prior.

Dan sends the picture of the mismatched paint swatch on his own room’s ceiling, with no caption, and almost immediately Phil replies.

 

_Phil: I’m genuinely not going to be able to sleep tonight because of that now THANKS_

_Dan: night x_

 

When Phil replies with a goodnight text, Dan switches off the bedside lamp and settles down. Though he does prop his phone against the pillow beside his own and spreads his arm across the other side of the mattress as he normally would.

If it was anyone else in his position and he knew they were doing this he’d probably laugh and fake-gag, but what nobody knows won’t hurt them.

It’s only a week.

 

**Author's Note:**

> i was originally going to also write a companion piece to this from Phil's point of view but i doubt anyone would care so i didn't lmao so pls enjoy this standalone fic
> 
> twitter; bloggerhowell  
> tumblr; cafephan
> 
> (title credit: payphone by maroon 5)


End file.
